Let me say this right up front. I hate Christmas. I’m a believer, not an atheist, but it is difficult to like something that has been so unpleasant for me. Sure, I’ve gotten some great presents for Christmas like the German shorthaired pointer I received at age six, or the catcher’s mitt I received the next year, but Christmas has simply been an ugly time of the year for me.
I was a mere six months old when my first Christmas arrived. The tradition in my dad’s family was to go to grandma Roese’s house for Christmas dinner. All the relatives would congregate at grandma and grandpas to open presents and enjoy her home-cooked dinner. Then we would all sit around their front room and catch-up on the happening and gossip.
On my first Christmas, I would be one of the pieces of gossip that would actually be passed around the room to be cuddled and examined. Mother Nature dropped a six-inch blanket of cold white crystals on Springfield that Christmas eve, so we left early to get to grandmas. Mother had read in the paper that friends of theirs had lost their house to fire that previous evening. Since we were running early dad asked mom if she wanted to drive by to see if they needed anything. So instead of turning off Taylor Avenue onto Cornell he went straight. As he neared the train tracks on Taylor, the car started to slide on the fresh now. “Now would be a great time for a train to be coming”, he joked. The blare of a train horn filled the air as car met train and an exciting ride ensued.
No one was injured, but the china and glassware presents wrapped and stowed in the back seat with the baby, me, took a terrible beating. I’m told I laughed and giggled through the entire adventure. This simply set the stage for Christmases to come.
Years two through four were uneventful, but once I started school I found Christmas vacation an occasion. I had perfect attendance, but the first day of vacation found me covered in little red splotches. The German measles kept me inside and in bed for the entire two weeks of vacation. My understanding was that you only got the German measles once. I was wrong. Since I didn’t build an immunity, over the next run of Christmas vacations I had regular measles twice, German measles four times, mumps, and chicken pox. All occurred beginning as each Christmas vacation began.
In my freshman year of college I finished my finals for the first semester only to contract swine flu. I was so sick the college nurse came to my dorm room. I’m one of those rare people whose temperature drops when I’m really sick. When she took my temperature to find a cool 94-degree reading, she promptly got on the phone to my mother and told her to please come get me and get me to a doctor. She later confided to me that she thought I was going to die on her. That evening the school was serving Cornish hens with all the fixings for dinner. My dorm mother figured if chicken soup was good, Cornish hens would be better, so she went to the cafeteria and got two hens with all the trimmings. After stuffing those two dinners down me, my mother arrived to take me home.
Sophomore year, hooray I was healthy, but a blizzard invaded central Illinois. It took six hours to drive from Jacksonville to Springfield and upon arrival we were snowed in for the entire Christmas vacation. See why I don’t particularly like Christmas?
Junior year found me healthy. A six-inch blanket of snow was falling on Christmas Eve and my mother and I were making pies for Christmas dinner. The phone rings. My neighbor is calling. “Fred, I need help. I bought a bunch of presents for the kids and they all need some assembly. Please bring some tools.” He had two boys, ages six and eight, and a nine year-old girl.
My mother and I loaded some tools and a twelve pack of beer on the sled and trudged the quarter of a mile through the snow to their house to lend assistance. Upon arrival we found his kids were fast asleep and the front room floor was covered in bicycles, slot track, train sets, a doll house, and a dozen other goodies that all had packets of screws, bolts, nuts, washers, and sets of directions awaiting our arrival. Although my friend worked with his hands, he wasn’t handy. I think the motto for the evening was “Let the games begin.”
“Oh my God” my mother uttered in disbelief, “why would you buy so many things you have to put together?”
“Stupid, just plain stupid.” he replied. “Can you help?”
“Sure”, mom replied, “but let’s have a beer first.”
As the log fire crackled in the background, we began. Mom grabbed a set of instructions telling us which bolt went where and which slot was slot C. We toasted each success with a release of carbonated beverages. After five or six of these successes, we decided a pot of coffee was needed for any additional success.
Progress was almost halted with the completion of the slot car track. The kid in all of us chose to test its completion, almost sidetracking our efforts. My friend Don’s wife Barb reminded us there was more to assemble, so we reluctantly returned to the assembly line to complete those yet unfinished assemblies. It was about four thirty in the morning, and except for a pile of unused screws, bolts, etc, our job was complete.
Mother and I packed my tools on the sled for the walk back home. Upon arriving home, we needed to complete the pie making we had put on hold. We were giddy. I don’t know if it was a lack of sleep, a few beers, two pots of coffee or the joy of helping a young married couple assemble Christmas for their kids, but it was the best Christmas I’d had.
As the pies came out of the oven, my dad came down stairs followed by my younger brother ready to open his presents. We made another pot of coffee and while sitting there at the kitchen table my father looked up and said “what is that on the ceiling?”
Mom and I looked up and started laughing. “That’s pie crust. We had a little pie dough fight while making the pies last night.” Dad just shook his head, but everyone remarked that the pies were the best we’d ever made. They wanted to know what we’d done differently this year. I think we filled them with the spirit of Christmas.
Since that Christmas I have endured colds and the flu, but no major illnesses. Since I got married Christmas Eves were spent at my wife’s parents’ house where talk of corn, beans, trucks and fertilizer fills the air. I have no interest in any of these topics so interest was replaced with boredom. We took over the Christmas Day meal, so I get to spend my time cooking which I love and watching the grandkids open their presents. Christmas has become much better, but I will never forget that Christmas Eve/Morning in my neighbors’ front room. That was a Christmas to remember!
I read that more people have fatal heart attacks on Christmas Day than any other day of the year. With my history, I will probably be one of those statistics and end up face down drowning in the hated cranberry sauce. But until that day, I will always remember the wonderful Christmas with the laughter, frustration and joy involved in that simple phrase, “Some Assembly Required”.